THE BUTTERFLY CAGE: an interview with Rachel Zemach

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: We're just a few days from September, Deaf Awareness month, and we have a wonderful guest to kick it off for us. Diana Todd, a/k/a Bibliophile, is a long-time commentor here who is also part of the Deaf community. She offered to interview Rachel Zemach about her critically-acclaimed memoir, THE BUTTERFLY CAGE.

Diana and Rachel are also giving one lucky commentor the chance to win a signed copy of THE BUTTERFLY CAGE. Thank you, Diana!

 

DIANA TODD: So excited to introduce Rachel Zemach here on Jungle Red Writers blog.  Rachel was living in England with her sisters and parents, themselves authors and illustrators of children's books, when she suddenly lost her hearing at the age of 10.  She learned Sign Language at school in America after her family moved back to the States. She has written a memoir, THE BUTTERFLY CAGE, about her experiences as a Deaf teacher in a Deaf classroom at a public school.  

Welcome, Rachel!

Your poignant memoir, The Butterfly Cage is about your experiences teaching Deaf children at a public school and at a residential school where all of the students are Deaf.

How did you come up with the title "The Butterfly Cage"?

 

Rachel:  I was looking for a title, and I had just written two chapters:  one titled "Blood" and one (that I later deleted), that had a description of a time in my classroom when we had some butterflies hatch from caterpillars then released them. To our surprise, when they first came out of their cocoons, we saw spots of blood.  We thought they were hurt, but it was a natural part of their growth process.

The title "Butterflies and Blood" suddenly hit me and I was excited.  The beauty and tragedy combination reminded me of my experiences in Deaf Education.  Though there were mixed reactions to the title.  While some loved the title, others hated it and I eventually changed it to "The Butterfly Cage".  The metamorphosis the butterflies go through is like my students learning American Sign Language. The "cage" is the mainstream school.  The title fits better and sounds less like a horror flick.

 

What kind of challenges, besides the lack of American Sign Language interpreters, did you face since publishing your memoir?

 

Rachel:  Oh my goodness. The hard part is hiring a publicist or a book marketer who knows about book marketing AND who knows the world of the Deaf community. (It’s icons, values, major institutions, and resources).  I have not been able to find that, so either I work with hearing people, who have no knowledge of Deaf Culture, or Deaf people who have limited experience with marketing.  For me hearing publicist, fighting for me, and for my friends in the Deaf community to have access, including when I am on the radio, is a new experience.   It is a steep learning curve for outsiders.  

Another tricky issue is deciding whether or not to use my voice.  I do not want to alienate Deaf people but I do not want to rely on an interpreter to voice for me either. The ability to speak is a privilege for sure, but the decision of whether to do that does not come lightly at all.  I myself had the gut punch experience of seeing someone I’d always signing, suddenly speaking with their mouth.  It is a disconcerting and alienating feeling.  

 

A recurring theme in your memoir is about ableism.  Can you tell us a bit about that?  

 

Rachel: I loved that quote "I read books, not lips" by Brendan Stern, that you shared with me.  

 First, there is the unconscious assumption that speech, hearing devices, and being mainstreamed in hearing classes makes the person smarter and better somehow than if they sign and are in a Deaf class, or proudly Deaf-identified.  

Second, that same assumption is applied to Deaf staff members.

Third, is the lack of accountability the Administration and staff have with evaluating problems.   The assumption is always that being Deaf, or knowing ASL is the problem.  When in reality, the root causes are language deprivation due to families not being encouraged and required to learn ASL early on in their child's infancy. Also, poor quality of education, and the dearth of Deaf teachers in public, mainstream schools, which 85% of our students attend.

 

Speaking of families, I read about a couple who found out their baby was Deaf before it was born.  The hearing couple decided to learn ASL before the child was born, and they also made friends with other Deaf people.

 Rachel: WOW, that’s fantastic!

 

As a Deaf Author, what have you learned since you published your memoir in April 2023?  

 

Rachel: I have learned that marketing is a full time job!  It is totally worth it, just like all of the work writing the book was.  Also, do not write a book with the expectations of making money.  There are other rewards, including stunningly passionate and powerful letters from readers telling me how my book impacted them.  One feels more connected to the human race, in very positive ways.  

As a Deaf Author, I learned that the Deaf community are absolute champs about spreading the word about my book.  Even though I wrote the book for hearing people, I held firm to my principles.  When hearing editors wanted to remove the Deaf POV, I refused to do that.  It's always been clear to me that if my book did not earn the respect of the Deaf people— whom I respect—then I would not have done my job. I treasure their opinions.

 

You are organizing a dinner party.  Which writers, dead or alive, would you invite?

 

Rachel: Wow.  Tears sprang to my eyes at this question.  All of your questions are great.  My answer is not hard.  Paddy Ladd, Mary Karr, Mark Drolsbaugh, Ayelet Waldman, Sara Novic, Michael Chabon, Joyce Maynard, Jason Rezaian, Raymond Carver and Anne Lamott. And there are many more! I would also invite an ASL interpreter (or two).  I would also like to invite all of my brilliant Deaf and Deaf-adjacent friends who want to, or have started, writing their own books.  I want everyone to write books now, especially those who can help get the word out about the Deaf experience; to help hearing people understand what it is and what it is not.  

One word of warning about this dinner though:  I am not much of a cook.

 

THE BUTTERFLY CAGE

Joy, heartache, and corruption: Teaching while Deaf in a California public school

This book is tender, funny, surprising, and disruptive. You'll be a fly on the wall in a Deaf classroom in a public school, watching a Deaf teacher struggle with staff, administration, and aides who sabotage the teachers at every turn. You’ll also see the children struggle with a principal who removes their textbooks, a vindictive, power-hungry speech therapist, and a system that leaves them defenseless against it.

You'll also meet a language-hungry boy who will capture your heart and run away with it and the political, fiercely intelligent elite members of the Deaf community who rally to change legislation after his life takes a shocking turn. Learn from these true stories of individual students and their quirky, fallible teacher, what the deepest feelings and dilemmas of Deaf and hard of hearing people are, and why 90% of our students around the country are being unnecessarily set up for failure.

Rachel Zemach was hearing for half of her childhood, until an accident left her Deaf at age ten.  But it was not until later, over a ten year period when she taught Deaf classes at a hearing public school, that she began to identify as Deaf with a capital D.  Rachel Zemach's parents were also authors and illustrators of children's books. 

 

You can find Rachel's memoir, The Butterfly Cage here. You can find out more about Rachel at her website, you can friend her on Facebook, follow her on Twitter as @rachel_zemach and enjoy her Instagram posts at @mezemach.

THE SIGN FOR HOME by Blair Fell

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Those of you who enjoyed D.R. Todd's post yesterday will recall one of the books she recommended was THE SIGN FOR HOME, by Blair Fell. Readers, we are all over your recs, because today? I'm interviewing Blair Fell about his amazing debut novel!

Now, you need to know the novel is new, but Blair has had a long career writing - his work has appeared in places like OUT Magazine and the Huffington Post, his multi-award-nommed plays have been produced across this country and abroad, and he's written for television as well, most notably for QUEER AS FOLK.  

 

Then he wrote THE SIGN FOR HOME. And it took off.  In manuscript form, it won the prestigious The Doris Lippman Prize for Fiction from City College of New York. Then it was an Indies Next pick. An Indies Introduce pick. It was long-listed for the Fiction Center’s First Book Award. It was an Amazon Editor’s Best Romance pick (though it’s a lot more than a romance.) Most recently, it was recommended by Reese’s Book Club.  

I don't want to make him blush, though, so let's get on with the interview! 

 

Julia: Give us the 4-1-1 on THE SIGN FOR HOME.

Blair: The Sign For Home is a coming-of-age/buddy/love story about a young, straight DeafBlind Jehovah’s Witness, his Gay interpreter, and the adventure they go on together to find out what happened to the girl the young man had loved and lost.

Julia: You’re known for your work as a screenwriter and playwright, as well as being an essayist. Why did you choose to tell this story as a novel?

Blair: This is probably a cliché, but I didn’t choose it to be a novel, it chose me. I knew nothing about writing a novel, and basically thought it was an impossible idea. Novelists are my heroes. I never had considered long form fiction before other than to tell myself I couldn’t do it. But I had this idea for a story about an interpreter and a DeafBlind guy (very different from what the novel turned out to be) and I started to write it as a play, but from the first two pages the damn thing insisted I write it as prose. I told the characters I didn’t know how, but they said, “shut up and just do what we tell you.” So I did. Spent a long ass time writing it, since I didn’t think I knew how, and, well, turns out I did know how to write a novel. Or I know how to follow direction of characters that want to be written. God, I hope that didn’t sound pretentious.

 

 

Julia: Honestly, it sounds pretty much like the way those of us who wrote novels from the start went about it. 

So you had the writing chops, but it's your background - thirty years as an ASL interpreter for the Deaf – that gives you the personal experience to tell Arlo’s story. How did you come to interpret? Has it been your “day job,” or a passionate avocation?

 

Blair: This is a true story. Everything good that’s happening in my life at this moment is due to two devastating heart breaks in my life. The first happened when I was in college. I fell in love with my straight “best friend” (in quotes because I thought he was my best friend, I don’t think he did.) He was a writer and taught me to adore fiction. But he fell for a mutual friend (a girl, who originally was into me.) She had convinced both of us to take ASL at Gallaudet, a Deaf university on a consortium with the college we attended (The Catholic University of America). I was mostly excited about getting to spend more time with my friend during the commute. But it turned out that I also loved the ASL classes and took to it pretty fast. Then as my two friends officially fell in love, my broken heart got worse, and I spent a ton of time weeping and stalking them. It got bleak. The autumn of my sophomore year I discovered Gallaudet had a “special student” program where hearing students could live and study there for a semester or year. I jumped at the chance – basically so I wouldn’t harm myself any further. So I transferred there for the Spring semester, and several other far-away colleges after that, and never went back to Catholic U. I always say Deaf people saved my life. Years later, after hunting for a lover who was a writer, I decided to become a writer myself (playwright at the time) and I needed a survival job, so screened to be an interpreter and was hired. At first it was just my day job, but over the years it’s become a job I adore. I love working with and for the Deaf and DeafBlind. It’s a wonderful, vibrant culture that has given me so much. It’s also a career that marries so perfectly with writing. I’m insanely lucky.

 

Julia: I'm not going to tell you what to do, but I think I see your next novel in that answer.

From a craft perspective, what do you find most challenging writing from the perspective of a DeafBlind protagonist? I mean, most of us try to use the five sense to enrich our character’s life on the page, but this strikes me as a huge leap.

Blair: It was really hard. The main character, Arlo Dilly, has Usher syndrome type 1. He was born with sight, but loses it as he grows up, and as the action of the book begins he has very, very little useable vision. Think a blurry pea-sized hole where he can gather very basic information with the help of assistive devices. So while writing Arlo’s character’s POV I focused on his strongest senses, touch, smell, taste. I also told his story from the second person present tense point of view (the “you” tense), in order to bring the reader into a non-traditional way of experiencing the world, and also to emphasize his emotional alienation rooted in his abusive upbringing. There is a huge world one can experience with touch, taste and smell. I spent a lot of time interviewing DeafBlind folks, including one of my dear friends who was a major help in teaching me what sorts of things they eroticized and fell in love with, as well as the things that frustrated them the most. As a hearing-sighted writer I had to be very careful how I wrote the DeafBlind characters, and so sought a lot of feedback from Deaf and DeafBlind sensitivity readers. Now, about 65% of the book is told from the gay interpreter Cyril’s POV, which is first person past tense, a much easier POV for me to write in since it’s basically me, and a necessary one, since I wanted us to also see Arlo (a fairly nice-looking young man) and the visual world that’s happening around him. I worried the second person might be a challenge for some readers, but it’s turning out readers are really responding to Arlo’s POV, and I do hope it is expressing the richness of the tactile world.

 

Julia: That sounds like a brilliant way to shake the reader up and let them know, "You're in a very different skin than you've experienced before." 

Okay, now I want to admit to a little, say we say, reception envy. THE SIGN FOR HOME has made a huge splash, with glowing reviews all over the place, longlisted for at least one award, an editor’s pick on Amazon and recommended by Reese’s book club, which, let’s face it, is much cooler than most of us can aspire to. How does it feel to be an overnight sensation after (ahumph) years in the writing biz?

Blair: Um … it feels really great. Except I’d never describe it as either “overnight” nor “sensation.” Of course, I also suffer from the disease of “it’s never enough.” That said, I’m insanely grateful. As I pointed out novel writing was new to me, and the path to publication was idyllic once I sent it out. (It was more like I was giving up and wanted to know if I had wasted my time. So during COVID in 2020 I asked a friend, the novelist James Hanaham, if he knew someone professional I could send it to. He suggested his agent. (I had no idea how big of a deal this agent was) So I sent it. He took it and sold it. But that was also after eight years of writing the novel, and 30 years of writing in other formats … and a whole lot of misery, frustration and failure along the way. Face it, I’m old – way older than most other debut novelists, and I’m well aware of that. So I’m trying to live in gratitude and really feel how rare this is to sell a book at this point in my life and to have readers respond the way they have been. That’s the best feeling, when my readers send me messages about how the book touched them, or helped them to understand their relative who has Usher syndrome 1, or enjoyed seeing themselves represented in fiction for the first time or got them to understand more about interpreting or the DeafBlind community or made them laugh and cry. (The crying thing it seems happens a lot.) Hearing that is so humbling and far beyond my expectations. So how I feel is great, grateful and insanely lucky.

 

Julia: Good news - in the mystery writing community, we have loads of older debut novelists, as well as writers who work for decades before "suddenly" becoming acclaimed. 

Dear readers, what are your questions for Blair? 

 

Arlo Dilly is young, handsome, and eager to meet the right girl. He also happens to be DeafBlind, a Jehovah’s Witness, and under the strict guardianship of his controlling uncle. His chances of finding someone to love seem slim to none.

And yet, it happened once before: many years ago, at a boarding school for the Deaf, Arlo met the love of his life—a mysterious girl with onyx eyes and beautifully expressive hands which told him the most amazing stories. But tragedy struck, and their love was lost forever.

Or so Arlo thought.

After years trying to heal his broken heart, Arlo is assigned a college writing assignment which unlocks buried memories of his past. Soon he wonders if the hearing people he was supposed to trust have been lying to him all along, and if his lost love might be found again.

No longer willing to accept what others tell him, Arlo convinces a small band of misfit friends to set off on a journey to learn the truth. After all, who better to bring on this quest than his gay interpreter and wildly inappropriate Belgian best friend? Despite the many forces working against him, Arlo will stop at nothing to find the girl who got away and experience all of life’s joyful possibilities.

You can find out more about Blair and his writing at his website. You can also friend him on Facebook, check out his pics on Instagram, and follow him on Twitter as @BlairFell.